Thorning's chance to press China for media freedom

Denmark's Prime
Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt is in China this week to meet with top leaders,
according to international news reports. CPJ's Advocacy and Communications
Associate Magnus Ag and Senior Asia Program Researcher Madeline Earp co-wrote
an op-ed calling on Thorning--as she is called in the Danish press--to raise the
issue of press freedom. An edited version ran in the Danish newspaper Politiken today.

Speaking truthfully to China on its repression of human rights can be a tricky endeavor in diplomatic affairs, but Helle Thorning-Schmidt has a prime opportunity to raise press freedom on her trip to China. Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton did not give the issue public priority during their visits earlier this month, but as Thorning meets with top Communist Party leaders and addresses a World Economic Forum meeting in Tianjin, the opportunity must not be wasted.

Foreign
correspondents in China are accustomed to uncooperative local authorities, even
since the government agreed that the foreign press no longer needed official
permission to report--a concession granted prior to the 2008 Olympics. Here, at
the press freedom organization Committee to Protect
Journalists, where we document attacks on journalists around the world, China's
noncooperation looks increasingly like organized obstruction.

In
2011, makeshift regulations appeared on Beijing city websites, barring
international reporters from a potential site of anti-government
demonstrations. This year, the parking lot of a hospital where high-profile
dissident Chen Guangcheng was undergoing treatment was declared off limits. Officials
threatened to revoke visas for journalists violating the improvised exclusion
zones. That risk was underscored when China's Foreign Ministry declined to
renew the credentials of Al-Jazeera English correspondent Melissa Chan without
explanation, forcing her to quit the country in May.

Why
now? Top-down information control is tight in advance of new leadership
appointments at the Chinese Communist Party's 18th National Congress this fall.
Authorities censored the U.S.-based Bloomberg news agency for a June report on
financial assets held by the family of Xi Jinping, who is tipped as the
country's next president. Hong Kong's South
China Morning Post reported this week that Chinese sales of Bloomberg's
terminal service, which offers real-time financial data and was unaffected by
the censorship, have since declined. On the ground, anti-foreign sentiment is also
high. State CCTV host Yang Rui caught
the nationalist tone at its most unpleasant when he crowed about Melissa Chan's
expulsion on social media: "We kicked out that foreign bitch."

Danish
journalists got a taste of what it's like to cover top Chinese party members in
June, when President Hu Jintao dodged critical questions by simply refusing to
participate in a press conference on his trip to Denmark. Local reporters in
China have it even harder: CPJ documented at least 27 journalists in jail as
of December 1, 2011. Just as international journalists comb domestic media for
upcoming stories, local reporters rely on the foreign press to publicize
stories that are banned at home.

Now
the foreign press is asking for help. In August, the Foreign Correspondents'
Clubs in Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong reported four incidents of harassment
against international reporters. More than 20 German journalists wrote to
Merkel the same month about worsening reporting conditions in China. CPJ appealed
to Clinton on the same issue earlier this week. Yet although some German news
reports said Merkel had raised the issue privately, coverage of their
subsequent China visits focused very much on economic and political
negotiations--without acknowledging that an unfettered international media is
essential to both.

Thorning
has a chance to pick up the slack. She should emphasize that press freedom is a
fundamental human right. But she should also underline that for China to
participate in a global networked economy, it must welcome global
journalists to work freely.

Madeline Earp is senior researcher for CPJ’s Asia Program. She has studied Mandarin in China and Taiwan, and graduated with a master’s in East Asian studies from Harvard. Follow her on Twitter @cpjasia and Facebook @ CPJ Asia Desk.

Comments

Do they not realize that being bone heads and trying to keep journalists squashed under a rock looks extremely suspicious, and makes it totally obvious that they're trying to hide something? The truth is the truth. Maybe if they didn't suck so bad, they wouldn't mind if the truth got out. Just saying. Like, no offense or anything. :D